Buried Treasure: The Poems That Saved My Life, #1

By Cleo Valerie Forstater

Life could be better than you've ever dreamed, if only you could believe it. 

But how can you believe something that is better than you could imagine?

And how can you truly trust and believe when it feels like life has broken your heart? 

 

The breaking hasn't broken you. 

The breaking exposes the treasure that has been in you all along. 

The true you - messy, unnacceptable and full of glory. 

 

This book of poems and prose tell the story of a human heart, coming alive as it is overtaken by a love it could never have imagined existed. 

 

The Poems That Saved My Life is a collection of poetry, written from the moment artist and poet Cleo Valerie was born-again, and shared in the order they were written in; accompanied by reflections, stories and testimonies to bring you deeper into the richness of the poems.

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This book allows you to journey intimately through the story of one human hearts' glorious, messy and unbelievably beautiful salvation, and to find in it permission: to bring your whole and broken self to the one who loves you more than life itself.

 

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cleo Valerie Forstater
• Release date: Nov 30, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223643500

Book preview

Prologue

You rush around 

with blood pouring out of flesh wounds, 

and you’re surprised to find yourself 

surrounded by sharks. 

You never took time to heal.

The years I spent discovering God started with coincidences. Too many coincidences to be coincidences.

"The universe is definitely talking to me," I eventually had to admit, after having multiple people separately say the exact same things about me, to me. Answers to the questions I was asking in the privacy of my own mind were turning up consistently. They inevitably led to more questions, which led to more answers, which led to me learning about the character of God.

Eventually, God became for me another name for "the universe, or the source of all things" - a nameless, or many-named, spiritual sort of energy, presence, being. Not being as in a being, but more beingness.

I learned that God is love, that God is eternal, that God is joy. I learned that God fills all things and is present everywhere. I learned that there is no fear in love, and that it was fear that held me back from the full realisation of love. I started to intentionally pursue overcoming fear for love’s sake. I came to believe and be convinced that the purpose of my life was to be used by God, to love; and daily, diligently, I would dedicate myself to that purpose.

God was speaking to me, and I was sharing what I was learning. I was being used for love’s purposes. But there was always something missing. I thought that everything I heard was only given to me to give away. I believed, deeply, that the purpose of my life was not to be loved, but to be used.

One of the things I received during that time was this short poem. I have titled it Prologue, as I wrote it before I was born-again. It is one of the pieces of writing I shared that impacted a lot of people online. I hadn’t realised that it was for me. I didn’t realise that I wasn’t really taking in any of the things I was sharing. I didn’t realise God was speaking to me. I didn’t know that I was worth Him speaking to.

I went around the world searching for God.

No one told me He was the one who wanted me.

You Are The Reason, pt. 1

You are the reason 

why the skies are blue; 

‘cause my eyes light up 

at the sight of you. 

You are my baby, 

no one else will do. 

So come here, darling, 

give me all of you.

On the day I was born-again - the day I accepted God for who He is - everything changed. I didn’t know what had happened at the time, and I still don’t understand the science behind it, but God came to live in me that day. He always had, but this was different. A very real exchange took place: I said "yes", and in accepting His proposal, I gave Him my life, and I received His in return. Two became one: I was a new creation. I had given Him permission to be exactly who He is, in me. I became His temple. I was sealed with the Holy Spirit.

And so, for the first time in my life, I had the presence of someone who unconditionally, perfectly, and unselfishly loved me, for me.

My testimony is weird in a way. Lots of people have incredible stories of giving their lives to Jesus, and miraculously turning from depression to joy, or anxiety to peace. Mine was the opposite. At least that is how it felt.

I thought I was happy, overall. I thought my life was good, that my relationships were amazing, that I was so blessed. I was so grateful. I was relentlessly positive. I had learned to become that way. It was a survival mechanism that my beautiful brain created to protect me from reality. A reality that would have caused me to lose my mind had I seen it sooner.

Love moved in: salvation.

My loving Father held the cells of my body together as the lights came on, and revealed the utter devastation of my soul, and my life, and my mind, and my heart.

This first year was marked by loss, grief, depression, confusion, conflict, torment, and a relentless desire to die: to be free of the incessant and unbearable pain I was in. It was also marked by Jesus, speaking over the chaos of my soul in dreams and visions, as though when I slept, my mind was clear enough to hear. I also had powerful encounters during worship. Those moments felt like coming up for air, while in the rest of my life I felt like I was drowning.

Why didn’t He just take the pain away? Now I can see. Who I was - my identity - was built almost entirely of lies. Everything I believed about myself, about God, about life, about people, was untrue. I was inside-out and upside-down.

Like everyone else, I’d been shaped by my relationships. I loved to love, and I loved the people I loved, so deeply. But, part of my survival mechanism was to see people as perfect, so that I couldn’t be hurt by them. Growing up, I had learned that it wasn’t safe to express pain. Since perfect people can’t hurt you, this is how I became unhurt-able.

Of course, that wasn’t true.

As you can imagine, no one was actually perfect, my relationships were not actually healthy, and I was actually incredibly hurt. Paying attention to that pain, and allowing that pain to be expressed, and seen, and healed, meant letting go of everything and everyone. It was a very long process, which required the absolute unravelling of everything I thought was me.

Thankfully, that year I also learned how to hear God’s voice - for me. I learned how to tune in to and recognise His still, small voice. His voice spoke truth into me, He told me who I really was - Loved By Him. Beloved.

His voice revealed a reality that I could never have imagined could be possible, let alone true. And yet, He is.

The first part of You Are The Reason came as I was listening to His voice while I was at work in a school. I was a teaching assistant, we were in gym class, and there wasn’t much for me to do. I looked up to see a square of blue sky through the small window in the gym hall ceiling. As I listened to His flow of thoughts in me, I heard the words:

"You are the reason why the skies are blue...

Because my eyes light up at the sight of you."

I felt like my chest would cave in at that moment. It was so holy. His words opened my heart so wide, to reveal a depth of love that was infinitely deeper than the pain that daily felt like it was swallowing me whole.

His words were seeds, planted in the darkness of my heart.

They didn’t seem to change my life immediately.

It took a while for them to break the surface, and even longer to shoot roots deep enough to sustain the life He is continuing to grow in me.

Every word He speaks is a seed of Himself, carrying in it the power the produce the truth that He has spoken.

Jesus taught:

"This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All